The Man Behind the Masks
by Magos186
Summary: What if Tony had told Jeanne the truth long before the events of Bury Your Dead? Here's my take on what might have happened. AU. Tag to season 4's Friends and Lovers.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This is an AU so a couple of Tony's background facts will be changed. It is an AU starting at the end of Friends and Lovers and will remain AU from then on. This will be a Tony/Jeanne pairing. If you don't like it, don't read it.

A/N 2: I own no part of NCIS. I just love Michael Weatherly and by extension Tony DiNozzo.

* * *

Tony sat on Jeanne's couch, not moving, not speaking. Jeanne was worried. Not because he was so silent, not because he was so still, but because of the look in his eyes. She'd always been able to read his eyes and now they looked…broken. "What's wrong?" She asked softly as she moved to sit on the coffee table in front of him, placing her hands on his knees. "Tony, what's going on? Talk to me, please."

"I lied to you," he whispered.

"What did you lie about?" She gently prodded.

"Only two things," he replied quietly looking at the floor. "My name is Anthony Giuseppe DiNozzo Jr. and I work for the Naval Criminal Investigative Service."

Jeanne drew back quickly, as if she'd been punched. "What?" She spit out as she moved away from him. Tony looked up at her for the first time that night and saw her confused and angry face. "It's a long story. Can you let me tell you the whole thing? Please?"

It was the despair in his eyes and flatness of his voice that brought her back to him. She sat down on the couch at his side and took his hand. She truly did love him. Earlier when they had been fighting about her ex, he nearly broke things off with her. He didn't say the words, but she could tell. She realized then how deeply she loved him and she didn't want to lose him. If he felt even a fraction of what she did, it would be worth fighting for. She needed to know the truth. "Go ahead Tony," she encouraged softly.

"Aside from those two things, everything else with you has been real. It's all been true. Even the story about that stupid horse. My father's third wife was to blame for that one. I've never been as honest with anyone as I've been with you. I wear a lot of masks. The cops at my old precinct used to call me The Chameleon because of my great adaptability at doing undercover work. I've been undercover so many times in the past seven years and never once have I messed up or blown my own cover." _That time with Jeffrey White doesn't count, _he thought to himself. "Even when I'm not undercover, no one gets to see the real Tony. No one wants to see the real Tony…at least not until you.

"When I was a kid, I was open and honest most of the time. My mother was an amazing woman. She was beautiful, talented, and she loved me more than anything. She was a world class pianist and composer. At least until she married my dad. They met in Rome and had a whirlwind romance. Seven months after they met, they got married and two months later I was born in Naples. I have dual citizenship.

"Anyway, things were great for the first year. Then we moved back to the States. My father has an estate in Long Island. He let my mother redecorate as she saw fit, but she only changed my nursery and the sun room. That's where her baby grand piano went and she did all her composing in there. She even set up a recording studio. The room was also soundproofed. When I turned three, she put me in lessons four times a week. But a few months after we moved there, my father changed. He was no longer the caring and affectionate man he was in Italy. He hardened, became obsessed with his business and money and had no problem showing off his trophy wife. He sure as hell wanted nothing to do with me. He hired the nannies and private tutors, but that was it. I never really saw him much. I had my mom though. She was my whole world. She's what started my love of movies. We would sit together for hours and watch old movies. She always knew different facts about the movie that she'd explain during it. But even focusing all her attention on me couldn't take away the pain my dad caused. She'd drown as much of it as she could in her music. Her songs were always breathtakingly beautiful and heartbreakingly haunting at the same time.

"The first time she touched alcohol more than recreationally was the summer after I turned seven. I hadn't really spent time with other kids so my mom decided I was old enough to go to camp. I spent the entire three month summer at sleep-away camp. When I came back, I knew in an instant things were different. The house had been redecorated in this horrible Louis the XV style. I hated it. I had this new canopy bed that gave me nightmares. I took to sleeping on the settee in the sunroom. So after a few months of that, she redecorated again. That time it was in a contemporary style, so it wasn't bad. She actually kept things like that. But it wasn't just the furniture that was different. She and my father now slept in different wings of the house. My room was in the same hallway as her sunroom, so she took the extra bedroom at the end of that hall. It was fun. The only time we ever had to venture into other parts of the house were for my father's atrocious parties, where I was forced to dress like a sailor, or to go to the kitchen or the yard. She tried to hide her drinking from me, but I found out. She always said I was a natural investigator. She called me her little PI. She told me I'd make an excellent detective one day. She didn't want me anywhere near my dad's business…didn't want me to become a monster like him.

"We lived like that for a couple more years, me going to camp for three months a year and taking care of my alcoholic mother the other nine."

When Tony didn't say anything else, Jeanne squeezed his hand. "What happened Tony?" She asked softly.

"It was the end of May…a few days after my tenth birthday and about a week before camp was due to start. I woke up in the middle of the night. It wasn't the rain that woke me, I just…I had a bad feeling. I knew something was wrong. So I went looking for my mom. She wasn't in her bedroom or the sunroom. I found her at the bottom of our marble staircase. I screamed. The butler came running. When he saw her, he called 911. I rushed down the stairs and knelt next to her. I held her hand. I didn't notice the blood pooled on the floor. I just stared at her face, calling her name. She never moved. The paramedics pronounced her dead a few minutes after they got there. The cops that showed up determined she tripped on the runner that was bunched at the top of the stairs and fell.

"After they took her away, the butler took me to my room. He cleaned the blood from me, took my bloody clothes, put me in a bath. Once I was clean and in new pajamas, he left me alone to call my father, who was in California on business. I snuck into the sunroom. My mom always kept it locked. Only the two of us had a key. I locked myself in and put on one of her recordings. It was the album she'd made just for me. I found her open journal on the settee so I curled up and opened it. All her pain was written there for me to see, but so was her love for me. Her last entry was written as a letter to me.

_Mio Caro Tonio,_

_I love you more than anything in this world. You are mio tesoro. You've given me the strength to survive these years. I have cherished every moment we've had together and I will cherish every moment we have together in the future. I will always be beside you Tonio. But to get to that future, I must change the present. I've enrolled you in the Rhode Island Military Academy, which will start the day after camp ends. This is not a punishment Caro. It is because you have never been to regular school, so I'd like you to learn the discipline you need to attend one. While you're gone, I will be going into rehabilitation. I am an alcoholic. I know you know that and I know it too. I've known since I started, but I didn't see a way out for us so I didn't stop. I'm sorry. When I finish rehab, I will be divorcing your father. This place is toxic to us both and I have enough money for us to live comfortably forever. I may even get back to music and once again go out on tour. You've been taking care of me for too long mio figlio and it's time I started to take care of you again._

_It's raining now amore __mio_. You know how I enjoy the rain. I think I'll go out and stand in it for a while…let it cleanse me of my sins and failures. Our lives will begin anew tomorrow tesoro and everything will be better. Our lives will be better.

_ Ti amo, mio bambino caro,_

_ Mommy_

Tony wasn't aware of the tears tracking down his face. He was just numb. He didn't want to talk anymore, he didn't want to remember anymore. He just wanted his brain to shut down for a while. He barely noticed when Jeanne took several tissues and cleaned his face. Once that was done, she laid him down on the couch, kneeling next to his head. "Go to sleep Tony," she said softly as she gently ran her fingers through his hair. "Sleep now, I'll be here in the morning." She continued to run her fingers through his hair, humming an old lullaby until his breathing evened out. Only then did she move into the bathroom to wash her own tears away. She couldn't help feeling heartbroken for the poor man she'd come to love. She could tell by the way he'd spoken that he never told anyone this story before. She was determined to finish hearing him out before making any decisions about them.

Once she was composed, she went back to the living room and opened her laptop, planning to keep an eye on Tony tonight. She quickly checked her email, noticing one from her ex. She was surprised at the message it contained. He finally understood that she'd moved on with her life. Even if she didn't have Tony, she would have never taken John back. Too much damage had been done by his betrayal. She could never trust him again. She deleted the photo he'd sent her and just as she was deleting the email, a phone rang. She knew from the sound it wasn't hers, so she searched Tony for his and found it in his coat pocket. She picked up his coat from the back of the couch to retrieve it and an envelope fell out with her name. His voicemail had kicked in by the time she opened the phone. She scrolled through his contacts and found one labelled "Boss." She quickly sent off a text message to that contact saying Tony wouldn't be coming to work the next day before she turned off the phone. She put it on the coffee table and picked up the envelope with her name. It contained a letter and a flash drive.

_Jeanne,_

_I have fallen for you—harder than I have ever fallen for anyone. In fact, this is the longest relationship I've had since college. I'm terrified of screwing this up because you've gotten in. You alone now have the power to break me. And you saw just how vulnerable I am that night we talked about sex. I didn't mean to give you this power over me, but you have it. I was talking to someone earlier and he made me realize that unless you know the truth, this will blow up on me. I plan to talk to you tonight. I plan to tell you things I've never told anyone. I'm going to let you in completely and trust you not to break me. But I have a feeling that after the shit day I had, I won't get much passed my mother before I just shut down. So everything you need to know is on that flash drive. It's a digital copy of my journal, which I started the day after my mother died. It's the only thing to know all my secrets, all my feelings. Sad when a word document is the only thing that knows anything about your real life. But please read it. I want you to know everything. If at the end, you decide you no longer want to be with me, I'll go away and you'll never see me again. But if you decide to give me a second chance, I swear I will never lie to you again. And I really hope you give me that second chance, because I love you. I don't know how it happened, or when it happened, I just know that it did. You're the only women I've ever felt this way about, Jeanne. Don't give up on me._

_ Please forgive me,_

_ Tony_

* * *

A/N: I do watch a ton of NCIS, but I've been bored so I've been marathoning it lately from the very start (and by very start I mean 2 part pilot that aired as JAG episodes). I'm currently in season 4. This popped into my head this morning. It's my first NCIS fanfiction. Please let me know what you think and if I should continue.

Italian Translations: Mio caro = my darling

Mio tesoro = my treasure

Amore Mio = my love

Mio Figlio = my son

_Ti amo, mio bambino caro_ = I love you, my darling baby


	2. Chapter 2

When Tony woke, it was to find himself lying on his back on a couch, Jeanne wedge between his side and the back of the couch. She propped herself up on one arm and looked down at him. "Hey," she whispered.

"Hey. You're still here," he stated, unable to keep the shock from his voice.

"I promised I would be. I found your envelope. I was up all night reading."

"So you know everything now?" He asked, his face open and vulnerable, the same as it always was when they had a serious discussion.

"Not everything. We still have things to talk about. Why don't you go get cleaned up and I'll make us some breakfast. I'm not running yet," she said as she leaned down to kiss him. Tony wrapped his arms around her and just held on for a few minutes.

"Crap!" He shouted as he bolted upright, forcing the both of them into sitting positions. "I need to get to work. What time is it?"

"Don't worry about it," Jeanne said as she grabbed his arm, forcing him to stay seated. "I sent your boss a text last night saying that you weren't coming into work today. So go get changed. Then we eat. Then we talk."

"Yes doctor," he replied with a smile. He gave her one last quick kiss and disappeared into the bathroom. Jeanne allowed herself a tiny smile as she moved into the kitchen. She grabbed the hazelnut creamer, hot chocolate packets, and the quiche that was in the fridge. She threw the quiche in the microwave to heat while she made the hot chocolate with the creamer instead of milk. Tony liked it better that way. He said it tasted like Baci – his favorite candy.

Half an hour later, the food was gone and the two were simply sitting there, staring down into their mugs. Neither was really sure how to start, even though they both knew they needed to. Suddenly the phone rang, breaking the silence. "That's not mine," Jeanne said. "I thought I turned yours off."

"You did. I turned it back on earlier to check my messages," Tony said as he pulled it from his pocket. "DiNozzo."

"The team's off rotation for the weekend," came the response. No hello, no how are you, just an order.

"Thanks boss. See you Monday."

"You get the weekend off?" she asked as he closed the phone.

"Yeah, my boss took our team off rotation this weekend."

"Can you tell me exactly what your job is? There wasn't much information about that."

"Well, I'm a Senior Field Agent. I work on the Major Crimes Response team, which is what we investigate. We do have set work hours, but a lot of times when we have a tough or important case we pull overnighters. It's a four man team. There's my boss, the supervisor senior agent, then me, then our junior field agent, and we also have a Mossad officer liason who works with us."

"And this is just for navy crimes?"

"Navy and marines mostly. The army has its own criminal investigative division."

"So your assignment with me…what's the deal?"

"A few months ago, my boss was injured in an explosion. He lost more than ten years of memories. He didn't remember me, my team…A few days after he woke up, some of it started to come back, he remembered a vital piece of information about an attack on a ship. When he told who he needed to, they didn't listen and the ship blew up. 23 people died unnecessarily. My boss was so pissed he quit. He left me in charge of the team. He handed me his badge and his gun and just said 'You'll do.' It was unbelievable, but they don't call him Gibbs, second B for bastard, for nothing. I held the team together as best as I could. And that included my two other team members, and our forensic scientist who worships the ground he walks on. Our ME had been friends with him for a long time, but Ducky was pissed at Gibbs and took it out on his assistant. Jimmy and I became good friends in those months while the boss was gone. We could commiserate with each other. He was also the only member of the team not to constantly tell me I wasn't Gibbs. It was an impossible situation. If I ran the team the way I wanted, they ignored me or ridiculed me. If I tried running it the way my boss did, they constantly told me I wasn't him. So when our agency director asked me to do a possibly long term undercover op, I jumped at the chance. I needed the escape being someone else would bring. It didn't even matter what the mission was.

"I can't really explain what the mission was. Just that it involved your father."

"But my father's a business man," Jeanne said shocked.

"And our investigation has to do with his business. I'm sorry, but if you want to know more you have to ask him."

The two of them took a few minutes to process everything before Jeanne urged Tony to continue.

"The mission I was given was to seduce you so I could get information on your father. By our fourth date, I knew that you didn't know anything about his business. I also knew then that I was starting to fall for you. When I go undercover, I usually take a week or two coming up with the details of that person's life, memorizing them. With this one though, I didn't have to do any of that. I decided to just be myself for once. I could actually be myself because my cover was a regular person. And if I had to choose a job other than being a cop, I'd choose film professor. I actually have a doctorate in Film Studies. I also have one in criminology and I have a masters in music, phys ed, and computer programming. All those private tutors paid off. After my year in the R.I.M.A., I took a state placement test since I'd never been in school and I placed in eleventh grade. Which I found ironic at the time since I was eleven. By the time I was twenty, I had earned a masters in all 5 subjects. When I was injured in our championship football game, it wasn't pretty. It took me two years to fully recover. So while I was recovering, I got my doctorates in my two favorite subjects.

"And I have veered very far off course," Tony said taking a sip of his hot chocolate. "So back to what I was saying. When I was given the cover of Tony DiNardo, film professor, I decided to just stop pretending. I decided I was going to be my true self. The one that only one other person has ever fully seen. So everything I've told you about myself has been true, Jeanne. I stayed away from relationships because I didn't want to open myself up enough to be hurt. I didn't want anyone to have that power over me. But then you came along and you got under my skin. I think the thing I love most about you is that you don't push. You gently nudge," he said with that charming smile of his, "but you never push. You understand things. When you asked me about sex, I told you the truth. You didn't push me. You understood and let me move at my own pace. You have no idea how much that meant to me. I didn't want to rush things with you because you were different and I didn't want to risk ruining us. Please tell me I didn't ruin us," he whispered, his head dropping to his chest.

A/N: Baci are the most delicious Italian chocolates made with hazelnuts. And RIMA stands for Rhode Island Military Academy.


	3. Chapter 3

_A/N: Italics are flashbacks._

Jeanne stared at the bent, broken man sitting before her. This was the turning point in her life. She could say "to hell with it" and walk away from Tony forever. She would be completely justified doing it. No one would blame her. But she'd always wonder what could have happened. He was right. The only thing he really lied about was what he did for a living. Everything else with her had been the absolute truth. He let down all his walls with her, he let her inside. Tony was more vulnerable than he ever let anyone believe. He was so easy to hurt. She held his fragile heart in her hands and at that moment, she decided to treat it like the treasure it was. It didn't matter why they'd met. They never really talked about family so there was nothing to tell his superiors about her father. It didn't matter what his last name was, it didn't matter if he was a teacher, a cop, or a trash collector. She'd seen the true beauty of his soul and that wasn't something she would throw away. She left her own chair and knelt down in front of his. She gently pulled on his legs, forcing him to turn towards her in his chair. His head was still bowed, so she put her finger under his chin, raising his head and meeting his eyes. "Tony," she said softly, "You didn't ruin anything. I love you and I'm not going to let you go that easily."

"Are—are you sure? Because I haven't really been in the best place lately and if this is some kind of trick—"

"It's not a trick. I promise you. You told me the truth. I know how hard that must have been. It just proves to me how much you care about me and how much you want this to work out."

"I really do Jeanne. I love you. And I know I'm going to make mistakes and mess things up because I haven't done this in a very long time, but I'm ready for a serious relationship and I want that with you."

"Okay then. So today, we stay in, watch movies, talk. Tomorrow, we come up with a plan of action. How does that sound?"

"That sounds perfect," Tony said as he pulled the woman into his arms. "That sounds really perfect."

TMBTM TMBTM TMBTM TMBTM

Eight months had passed since Jeanne found out who Tony really was. Life was not always perfect for them, but they managed to make it through together. To date, there were only two serious hardships that they faced. Sadly, they both happened within just two months of Jeanne learning the truth. The first nightmare they faced was the death of Paula Cassidy. Tony and Paula had never really dated, despite the brief one night encounter in Gitmo. If Tony had been a few years older when they met, it might have been a possibility, but he was too young for Paula when they did meet. It's not that she was too old for him, they were only three years apart in age, but she was very career driven, very focused. She knew what she wanted in life and she was long past short-term boyfriends. Although she was not completely immune to Tony's charm and though neither would ever admit it, they cared for each other deeply. While recovering from her encounter with the Kyle Boone wannabe, Tony actually took her up on her offer to talk about Kate. He didn't really have anyone else. There was no way he could talk to Gibbs and he sure as hell wasn't opening himself up to the Probie. Paula was a neutral third party, someone who had known Kate, someone who knew Tony and could both understand and help him grieve the loss of his partner.

The two agents kept in touch when Paula was reassigned to lead a team out of the Pentagon. They met a few times a month for drinks and emailed regularly. They became really good friends. When he had to go undercover as Ziva's husband and make out with her, Paula was the one who helped him work through his disgusted feelings. It's not that Ziva was bad looking, but she was far from his type and the fact that she was at least twelve years younger made him feel like a dirty old man. Kate may have teased him to death about dating younger women, but the truth was he never dated anyone more than five years younger than himself. There was also the fact that he did not trust Ziva, which just made working with her on that job even harder. A few months later he survived an entire day of being stuck in a box with Ziva, being shot, spending two days in Bethesda fighting off bronchitis that resulted as a combination of the fire smoke and cold dampness of the box. Paula was the one at his side, listening as he talked about being left out of a "team" dinner, having his injuries downplayed by some foreigner who thought just because she created a dossier based on his service records she actually knew anything about him.

The night Paula lost her team, Tony showed up at her apartment with Chinese food and beer, returning the favor of being there while she grieved, holding her when she cried, listening as she vowed revenge. That weekend was the first time he told her about Jeanne. He hadn't wanted to before that…he was afraid of how she'd react; especially if she found out he was undercover. But when he told Paula he loved Jeanne, she truly saw for the first time what she missed out on. She told him she was happy for him, but felt her last tether to the earth snap. So when she had the chance to save him, she willingly gave up her own life to do so.

Tony couldn't handle processing that scene. His mind was blank as he tried to come up with an excuse of why they shouldn't do it, but Gibbs knew him too well. He had already called in another team before his SFA even walked over to him. He told the younger man to go home, take the week off. But Tony didn't go home. He went to see Jeanne, his suit still covered in dust from the explosion, his eyes red while he tried to hold back the tears. As soon he saw Jeanne's face though, the tears came. She pulled him into the apartment and led him to the couch where he completely fell apart in her arms. She held him together through that whole ordeal. Even though she couldn't be at the funeral, too many agents would be there, the thought of her waiting for him kept him from falling apart a second time. His feelings for Paula were different than his feelings for Kate, but they were just as strong. And just like after Kate's death, he had nightmares for weeks. One was so bad he nearly broke Jeanne's arm when she tried to wake him up. That night he decided to start seeing a professional to help him deal with it all.

Not long after Tony's tragedy came Jeanne's with the death of her father.

"_How are you feeling?" Jeanne asked as they walked out of the hospital. They'd had a long night, surviving being held hostage at the hands of a crazy drug dealer and his junkie girlfriend. Tony had followed Jeanne when she went running down to the morgue, but when he went to pull his weapon he cursed himself in his head. He was still playing the part of a professor (for everyone else but Jeanne) so he left his gun in his car. He didn't want to risk anyone in the hospital seeing it. If he was alone with Nick, he could have easily made a play for the gun and unarmed the man, but he wasn't willing to risk either of the girls getting hurt. So he bided his time, formulating a plan as he watched his girlfriend cut open a dead body. She surprised the hell out of him when she stabbed Nick, forcing him to drop his gun. Once all the action was over and Tony stood holding the gun, he called a buddy over at Metro to come and arrest the dealer. They had the girl admitted to the hospital. _

"_I feel like I got hit in the head. All I want right now is a hot shower and some aspirin," Tony said wearily._

"_That actually sounds great. Add in breakfast and it'll be perfect," Jeanne replied with a smile. They were almost to Tony's car when a limo pulled up in front of them. "Oh my God, I can't believe I forgot."_

"_Forgot what? What is this?"_

"_My father. He wanted to meet you and take us to breakfast. I was going to tell you last night, but we got distracted."_

"_This is going to be great," Tony muttered as the door opened and the two climbed in the limo. _

_When Jeanne got the page about the death certificate, he was truly relieved. From there he could make up an excuse to leave. Unfortunately that didn't work when Rene revealed he knew exactly who Tony was. So he sent one of his men off in Tony's car while he dragged the young man with him back to the limo. They were discussing their plans for the morning, which consisted of going to Jeanne's apartment first so the couple could shower and change into fresh clothes followed by going to Rene's hotel for breakfast. Rene was about to ask them a question when the explosion happened. He yelled at his driver to hurry away, thinking he was the target. They stopped at a park. Tony thanked his years of training as a cop as he was able to compartmentalize everything that had just occurred and come up with a plan. He instructed the driver to take them to a bank ten miles away. Once at the bank, he pulled a key from his wallet and retrieved his safety deposit box. Inside were two new drivers' licenses, two passports, two encrypted burn phones, a watch, a set of keys, and an old leather backpack. Tony replaced the watch he was wearing with the one in the box, put the other contents of the box into the backpack, which contained ten thousand in cash, and returned the empty box. He had chosen that particular bank for a reason as he pulled Jeanne and Rene through the alley off the side of the building. He'd sent the limo off. It'd be too easy to track down and they needed to be as inconspicuous as possible. _

_The reason he'd chosen that bank was because on the street behind it, there was a long-term storage facility. He quickly led them to his locker, where a 1998 blue Toyota Corolla was waiting, two bags of clothes already in the trunk, one with clothes in all Jeanne's size. None of it could be traced to him of course, not the storage locker or the deposit box at the bank. They were under an alias. Of course he didn't explain any of this until all three were in the car and on the road to Baltimore. _

"_What is going on Tony?" Jeanne asked nervously. "That was your car back there."_

"_I don't know," he replied honestly. "So far I can only come up with two answers. The first is that they were aiming for me. It is my car after all and I can think of one person in particular I've pissed off enough to do it. The second option is far more frightening. Someone's been watching us and know that you've been on the night shift the past month and that I pick you up every morning for breakfast." At that, Rene started swearing loudly in French. _

"_So they were aiming for me then?" Jeanne asked, her voice oddly calm despite the situation. "Where are we going then? Why the trip to the bank?"_

"_I have several 'go to ground' aliases and options set up within a hundred mile radius. This is one of them. I altered it after I told you the truth. I included new ids for you as well as a bag of clothes for you in the trunk. Everything is registered under Joseph Salvatore. Your new id lists you as Leona Salvatore, my wife. I know what your father does and I had a feeling it would come to a head eventually. Currently we're on the way to one of my safe houses. I'll leave you both there, with one of the encrypted cell phones and we'll figure everything else out from there." Tony explained. He'd already disabled the GPS in both Jeanne's and Rene's phones. No one really talked for the rest of the trip. When they arrived at his safe house, a one bedroom condo on the edge of the city, Tony led the Benoits inside, making sure to take all the bags with him. He sat them down on the couch and sat on the coffee table facing Jeanne. "First things first," he said, taking her wallet from her. He removed her credit cards, license, and hospital ID. In exchange he gave her the fake license with her new name. He also removed his own credit cards and license from his wallet and put in the new license. He took all the cards and put them in a small metal lock box, which then got stashed in a secret panel behind the couch. He pulled the leather backpack into his lap and removed two hundred dollars. "Here's the plan. There's ten thousand in this bag. I'm going to shower and change, and then I'm going for groceries. After that, I need to go back to DC. I have to find out what's going on with the investigation and if they were truly after you or if this was just a message for your father. There's also a phone in this bag. Keep it with you at all times. I will contact you on this phone only. Don't use your own. I disabled the GPS, but they will still be able to trace a block radius with the cell towers so keep them off. If you need to make a call, use that phone only. It's encrypted and untraceable. I want you to stay here until I contact you. You won't need to go out, but I'm leaving you the car keys just in case. I want you to put all the clothes I have for you in the bag with the money that way if you need to leave in a hurry, you just grab that bag and go."_

"_I want to go with you," Rene said. "Jeanne obviously knows who you are Tony and with everything you are doing to keep her safe, I trust you. Whether this was a message or a threat, I need to get out. I will not risk my children's lives any longer. I would like to come to NCIS. They are they only ones I trust right now. You are the only one I trust right now."_

_To say the agent was shocked by Rene's words would have been an understatement. He was nearly floored by what the man had said. It actually took him a minute to regain his thought function. "Thank you, Rene. That means a lot to me. I will do everything I can to keep both you and your daughter safe. But coming with me is not a good idea. We both know the director hates you. That's why she set this up in the first place. She wants to take you down. She always has. She blames you for her father's death. I don't trust her to be rational if I bring you in. She may actually try to kill you. So no, you stay here with Jeanne. Let me get as much information as I can. Then we will formulate a plan. Please don't risk your life right now."_

_Rene looked from Tony's pleading face to Jeanne's and decided the young man was right. He would stay, for now. "Alright, I will defer to you for now."_

"_Thank you. Do me one favor though. I want you to use the same account you used for the limo to set up a hotel or rental somewhere else. Give her something to chase while we figure things out."_

"_That will not be a problem."_

"_Good. Then I'm going to go shower and get our plan underway. I spent most of the night on the floor of a morgue and I'd really like to get out of these clothes."_

_TMBTM_

_A few hours later, the elevator doors opened to reveal Tony's team and the director, and to them revealed Tony. Kort was also standing there, so the Italian decided to be his usual smart-ass self. "Hey, my car blew up this morning, did you do that?" He asked Kort, who then shoved him against the elevator, arm across his throat. Tony wasn't surprised when he looked out the corner of his eye to see three guns trained on Kort. When he was asked for the whereabouts of La Granouille, he went off on a small tangent about arms dealers and their names, revealing absolutely nothing. Once Kort was gone, the director pulled him and Gibbs into her office for a debriefing. While in there, Tony spoke a lot without really offering any information. When she asked him where Rene was, he told her he didn't know. As soon as she dismissed him, Gibbs pulled him down to Abby's lab. After Abby's usual tackle hug, she released him and his boss pulled him into the ballistics lab. It was one of the only soundproof rooms in the building which had the added benefit of being without a security camera. _

"_So where's the Frog?" Gibbs asked as he leaned against the desk in the room._

"_Safe with his daughter. I used one of my go to ground aliases that I adapted to include Jeanne."_

"_So she already knew who you were?"_

"_I told her a few months ago, the night that Detective Carson died. I was in love with her and I couldn't keep living a lie. It would have only ended badly. __I've never felt this way before s_o I took a risk and told her the truth. Surprisingly she didn't kick me out. "

"_I'm happy for you Tony. But why didn't you tell me? You could've let me know what was going on, why you kept disappearing."_

"_I could have, if you were still the Gibbs from before you got blown up. When you left, you said 'You'll do.' That's it. You know how my dad treated me, constantly told me I was worthless. When you said those words, that's exactly how you made me feel. And I know you didn't really remember anything when you said it, so I forgave you. But you shattered my confidence in my abilities. If it wasn't for Paula and Balboa, I wouldn't have been able to do the job. I nearly put an innocent man in prison because of it. The two of them helped me though. They reminded me that I was a cop for a long time before I met you…reminded me that I had a 90% closure rate while I was a homicide detective. I was more than qualified to do the job and they were right. I was able to do my job better than before. But this wasn't my team. McGee had a hard time listening to me. He wanted to be SFA, even though he wasn't ready. I never officially promoted him because I knew he couldn't handle it. So I was doing your work and mine still. One day I gave him an order and he argued with me for five minutes about it before Balboa came over and the two of them had a pretty much knock down, drag out argument that nearly led to actual blows. Sam actually revealed my true qualifications to McGee. After that, he started doing his job like he did when you were the lead. Ziva though, she never listened. She constantly challenged me and my authority, challenged my orders, so when the director gave me the chance to go undercover, be somebody else for a while, I jumped at it. I could actually be myself for once." Tony realized he'd gotten off track, so he hopped back to the original topic. _

"_When you came back, you didn't talk to me first. You didn't tell me you wanted your job back. You just demoted me, moved McGee's stuff and mine back to our old desks and left my probie out in the cold. You want me to respect you? That was one way to make sure I never did. You weren't in the right headspace when you came back. Your memory still wasn't all there. I gave up leading my own team because I didn't trust you to lead this one. Between your wonky memory and Ziva's arrogance, no one would have had McGee's six. I didn't trust you not to get him hurt. So I stayed, no matter how hard it was to go back to being SFA. And Ziva's bitching and sniping sure as hell didn't make it easier. I thought we'd gotten closer. We'd have a team dinner at her place regularly to help us bond, but as soon as she's in trouble, she goes running for Gibbs. You guys have a special bond and that's great. But we were partners for a long time before she came and that meant something to me. I guess it didn't mean as much to you. So you want to know why I didn't tell you? It's because I didn't trust you. That doesn't matter now. What matters now is that Jeanne and Rene are safe and they will stay safe. This team will find out who bombed my car and I'll formulate a plan from there."_

_Tony's plan would have worked too. He planned to go to Tom Morrow, Assistant Director of Homeland Security and former director of NCIS. He was a man Tony trusted and he would have been able to bring Rene in safely. However Rene was a stubborn man. He told the agent that this would never be over; his family would never be safe as long as he was alive. You couldn't get out of the business any other way. So he made his peace with his daughter, gave the couple his blessing on their relationship, and went to see Jenny Sheppard. He was dead before the sun rose the next morning._


End file.
